


Mekong Delta

by TawnyLocke



Category: How to Get Away with Murder
Genre: Episode S01E04 - Let's Get to Scooping, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-20
Updated: 2014-10-20
Packaged: 2018-02-21 21:15:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,831
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2482739
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TawnyLocke/pseuds/TawnyLocke
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Oliver was easy pickings for one Connor Walsh.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mekong Delta

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers for S01E04 - Let's Get to Scooping. I've become unhealthily obsessed with this episode I think, and what's written here will likely be made invalid by canon in a few days. Enjoy anyway!

THEN

Oliver was easy pickings. A cute guy who probably grew up in the shadow of more attractive siblings with flashier careers was Connor's guess, so poor Oliver stumbled along with a predictable career in IT wearing terrible glasses. It was easy to wrangle him along and offer himself as bait, to look with intent at another man while Oliver was standing in front of him and make him think like this was his last chance. Connor knew how to work with what he got, and Oliver seemed to take the bait without a lot of fuss, with only a little bit of self-aware resignation dimming the festivities.

Later on in bed, Connor was a little in awe. Oliver was probably the most responsive fuck he'd ever had, taking directions like a dream. He seemed to know instinctively what Connor wanted without a lot of prompting, which was rare if not impossible for a first time. He laid a flat palm on Oliver's stomach and Oliver raised his ass and let his chest fall on the bed to take his weight. When Connor let his hand slide in between Oliver's legs, Oliver immediately widened them to take more. The morning after, a quick stroke of Oliver's cheek resulted in a fantastic blowjob, and while that wasn't necessarily what Connor was after, he wasn't about to complain about the results.

He stayed in bed with Oliver on more than one night and sometimes had lovely non-awkward breakfasts, something he rarely did. This particular morning was free, or at least had classes that Connor could afford to skip. The emails were submitted into evidence and a new suspect was brought into the fray with the Aspirin Killer -- Connor thought he deserved the break. He rolled on top, Oliver grunting at the unexpected weight. Connor rested his weight on his forearms and raised himself up to look directly at Oliver, who squinted without his glasses.

"How many brothers and sisters do you have?" Connor asked.

Oliver's brow furrowed. "What a weird thing to ask after sex," he said. "Are you planning on blowing them too?"

Connor rolled his eyes. "I was just curious. I have a theory about you."

"Which is?"

"Can't say until you answer the question."

Oliver looked at him skeptically, but seemed to bypass his doubts. "Three."

"Seriously, Oliver? Names, occupations."

Oliver's face softened -- he looked vulnerable, a baby lamb stumbling along the wolf's path. Don't, Connor thought. Don't show that face to me. He said nothing.

"My oldest sister Camille is a nurse practitioner. She's in Liberia right now, and she's one of the first medical responders in a big health center for diseases. My older brother Oscar owns a money transfer business. Did you know that people sending money back to their relatives in the Philippines makes up 10% of its GDP?" Connor shook his head. "It is. It makes him a lot of money. My youngest sister Leila is in New York. She just landed a role in _The Book of Mormon_." Oliver smiled up at him, and a little part of Connor was touched that it was this easy for Oliver to share information. So easily given under the pretext of a silly game, without interrogation. "So what's the theory?" Oliver asked.

Connor made a big show of taking a deep breath. He was thinking of treating it like a presentation but changed his mind, deciding instead to rest his head on Oliver's nicely muscled chest. "Nothing revolutionary," he said. "Your siblings all have flashier careers than you, or careers that make them more money. You're the middle child who was always going to be solid and dependable, the guy with a stable job who makes responsible choices. And I'm guessing that a lot of people think all your siblings are really attractive." He placed his hands on the mattress to push himself back up again, to have a better look at Oliver's face. "You probably thought you were the boring, unattractive one compared to them."

Oliver bit his bottom lip, an obvious tell. "This is a little deep for a morning after."

"Professional Armchair Psychology 101, led by Professor Connor Walsh," he said. "Those people were wrong anyway." He slid down the bed and spent a luxurious amount of time showing Oliver just exactly how wrong he thought those people were.

NOW

He didn't knock when he got there, at least not right away. He leaned his head on the door, repeating things in his head but not yet able to wake Oliver up, who didn't deserve this mess landing on his doorstep. 

Please be there.

Please open the door.

I need help.

Oh god oh god oh god oh god oh god.

I screwed up. I screwed up so bad.

Fuck me. Make me forget, if you can bear the thought of touching me. Let me touch you. I'll choke on your cock and beg for more. I'll clean the grout in your kitchen, the ones with the weird blood-like stain that comes down whenever you cook something that steams it up. Fuck me with your glasses on. Do that weird thing in the morning that you do when you flail around for your glasses because you're convinced they fell off the nightstand while you were sleeping. I can hold my legs up for a real long time, did I tell you that? Want to put it to the test? My parents loved me and I still ended up like this and your parents didn't seem to give you any more attention than they thought you deserved and you're better for it. Kiss me. Kiss me until I forget. 

I never meant for this to happen.

You always had the strange ability to calm me down.

All that was true, Connor thought, but it was all useless noise in the end, noise that Oliver was unlikely willing to hear. He raised his hand to knock, because he hoped the sight of Oliver would be enough to help anyway.

THEN

He knew he screwed up when Professor Keating asked him to stand up. At least they weren't in class, but in the living room with all the others plus Bonnie and Frank in a loose circle was hardly better.

"Whatever issues are going on with your life, Mr. Walsh, do not drag them to work with you. I do not care. If you cannot separate the two, I will gladly bring in another student who can because there are a few people I know who would willingly step in. Am I clear?"

Connor nodded, at that moment ashamed enough not to speak.

"I didn't hear you, Mr. Walsh. Do I make myself clear?"

"Yes, Professor Keating."

"Good," she said. "Everyone, get ready for court in 30 minutes. Mr. Walsh, you're staying behind to review the depositions for the Kendall case. I need every minute of that videotape examined." She walked into her office, Bonnie and Frank right behind her.

Kendall's entire body was paralyzed. The only muscle he could move was his right eyelid, and he used this to communicate. A simple sentence could take five minutes to verify under the modified version of Morse code established by Kendall and his doctors.

"That's going to be a long night," Michaela said. Smug, justifiably so. He was tempted to toss out a quip about Aiden liking a finger inserted along with dick during anal sex, but he didn't really feel like fighting. "You deserved that and you know it," she continued. "What the hell were you thinking?"

"I wasn't," he admitted.

"It's because he isn't getting any," Asher said, and for once, Douche Face was right. "I recognize the signs of blue balls, my friends. And Walsh here is suffering from the bluest kind."

"So get some," Michaela said, looking carefully at Connor, strong warning clear in her eyes. "It's not like it's hard for you. You don't do boyfriends."

Wes looked at him. Earnest as usual, as if the world spun on candy and dreams even when he had daily evidence of how ugly life got. "What happened to your hacker friend?"

"He's no longer my hacker friend," Connor said. On good days, he could convince himself he didn't feel anything about that.

"Because he does boyfriends, I'm guessing," Laurel said. There were times when he forgot she was there at all.

"I'm sorry," Connor said. "Was Keating going after my ass an invitation to have an opinion on my personal life?"

"When you fuck up so badly that you almost screw the rest of us over, yeah," Michaela said.

Connor took a deep breath to steel himself. "It was a one time mistake. It will never happen again. Please butt out before I say anything about Aiden or Rebecca or Frank or Kahn or the doubtless countless skanks with no self respect who come stumbling out of Asher's room."

"You're an asshole," Laurel said, calm and unperturbed as an empty lake. She turned her back to him and went back to reading a report as if nothing had happened, and everybody followed her lead.

Got that straight, Connor thought.

NOW

What kept Connor tethered to this reality was Oliver's warm hand on his shoulder, his slow and steady breaths, that he had opened his door at 6 AM to a Connor who stank like smoke and looked like he had snorted a shitload of crystal meth.

"Connor, I can't help until you tell me what's wrong."

He looked at Oliver's kind face and couldn't quite keep the disbelief out of his voice. "You still want to help? Are you running for sainthood?"

"A saint wouldn't break the law because a cute guy asked him to."

"A decent guy would still try to help someone who looks like he could use it," Connor said. Why the fuck did he screw this up?

Oliver sat down beside him on the floor, a wonderful picture in his shirt and boxers even with that grudging expression on his face. His apartment door was still open. The hallways were quiet, and if people were getting ready for their day, they weren't making too much noise about it. Connor could almost believe that time was standing still.

"I can wait," Oliver said.

Connor tried to calm down, but that offer was enough to make him have another panic attack. His chest felt tight and it felt like his lungs were miles ahead of him, pumping air furiously to a body that wouldn't take any of it. He felt arms go around him, a voice saying _breathe with me, match my breathing okay, breathe with me_ and let himself get lost in that voice until he could think.

THEN

"So get this," Connor said, standing in his boxers in Oliver's room and preening because he knew Oliver was tracking him. "This new client, let's call him Blake, is busted for solicitation. He has a taste for hustlers of our kind apparently."

"Sex workers," Oliver corrected, to which Connor rolled his eyes.

"Hustlers," Connor said, stressing both syllables, "particularly those who look like they just graduated from high school."

"So...he's fighting the solicitation charge? How?"

"No, he wants the solicitation charge to go through. Do you want to know why?"

Oliver was smiling at him, even though Connor could tell he was also appalled by the details of the case. "Why?"

"Because," Connor said with relish, "it means he would have a good excuse for soliciting a hitman to kill his wife of 15 years, who can no longer please him sexually."

He found himself delighted with the prudish way Oliver was shaking his head. "That is screwed up," Oliver said.

"Isn't it great?" Connor took off his boxers and crawled his way up to where Oliver was sitting with his back to the headboard. "It would be a miracle if Keating pulls this off. He's on record saying yes to the fake hitman, but Keating is planning on pulling some sort of mental duress defense due to sexual incompatibility excuse. At the very least, he might get a reduced sentence."

Oliver's smile wasn't all the way there. "So what do you need me to hack into?"

"Nothing," Connor said, confused. "It's an exciting case."

"It's not exciting, Connor. That's sad."

"You're not looking at it from a defense attorney's point of view."

"I get that," Oliver said, "but it's still a shitty situation."

"Hey," Connor said. He took off Oliver's glasses because they got in the way of kissing. He bit Oliver's lower lip, which always caused Oliver to open his mouth and gasp. The next few minutes were a blur as Connor sat on Oliver's lap, lost in the pleasures of making out like teenagers, full of sloppy tongue and carefully stinging bites. "You're so good at that," he murmured.

"I like kissing you too," Oliver said, his voice going low. "It's like another escape."

"Oliver!" He's not your boyfriend, Connor thought. You don't do boyfriends, remember?

"Shut up." Oliver looked like he wanted to be flung into space rather than deal with the ridicule coming his way.

"Where do you escape to, huh, under the power of my kiss?" Oliver rolled his eyes at his attempt at humor and Connor had no choice but to poke Oliver's sides. It devolved into a tickle fight. He won of course, because he always fought dirty and wasn't afraid to grab Oliver's armpits, which Oliver was strangely squeamish about, no matter how many times Connor tried to disabuse him of that notion. "So?" he asked, sliding his leg in between Oliver's before levering himself up on his elbow and forearm to look his fill.

Oliver looked lost in thought for a minute, then firmly said, "Vietnam. People expect me to say the Philippines for understandable reasons, but Vietnam had that magic to me. You can imagine how happy my parents were to hear that."

Unexpected choice, and yet one more piece to Oliver's history. "Why there?"

"I loved it there. I dunno, something about it felt like home. I'd go back there again in a heartbeat."

"Never been," Connor admitted, ignoring the _home_ part of it. Oliver looked like he was about to say something but changed his mind, his mouth opening and closing quickly, his expression becoming more guarded.

"It's beautiful," Oliver said. "So beautiful that you can forget."

NOW

Connor didn't know how long they sat there on the hallway, but it was long enough. He calmed down, breathing in sync with Oliver, until his body and mind felt like it could function again despite the bowling ball weight of panic in his chest.

"It must be really bad," Oliver whispered.

"It is," he whispered back, afraid to violate the silence.

"What are your options?"

Connor let himself succumb to the temptation and laid his head on Oliver's shoulder. "Fight or flight." Oliver smelled like fresh laundry -- he breathed in the scent to get more of it.

"Can you win the fight?"

He closed his eyes. "No." His conscience would always win, even if he went to prison, even if there was a part of him that was convinced he did the right thing but went about it the wrong way. A human life was still lost and he still committed the crime of hiding it so that it looked like it never happened. He found that he couldn't look at his life like a case. That he could do it so effortlessly with other people shamed him profoundly then.

Oliver's voice shook. "Then you need to run, Connor. As far and as fast as you can. Somewhere nice, where you can start over. Maybe even forget."

 

AFTER

District 7 in Ho Chi Minh City was stunning, unlike any city he had ever been to. He has eaten pho sold on the street, delicate and flaky fish in curry sauce served on com dap in restaurants. The crowds were bustling in an entirely different way than in New York; people seemed even busier here and worked harder for far less. The random bursts of French influence that he could grasp the meaning of in a sea of things he could barely understand, the modern and streamlined right next to the traditional and somewhat ramshackle, the lights that tried to match Paris at night but ended up somewhere far prettier, more real -- all of it was a balm for a guilty conscience.

The US had no extradition treaties with Vietnam.

Connor waited three months before sending a postcard of the Mekong Delta to apartment 303. All he wrote on the back was an address in Ho Chi Minh City. 

It's been one month after that with no response. Not as of yet. He went on with his life as much as he could, trying to ease his way into this city both foreign and familiar, this country loved by someone far away. Any day now though. Any day now.

THE END


End file.
